Darrell Delamaide believes eurozone officials ”will not be able to roll over the new Greek officials with their traditional bullying and blustering,” and that “Tsipras won’t compromise” as he seeks some relief of the country’s debt.

The prospect of a Greek default on sovereign debt helped push the euro to new lows this week, but Brett Arends believes the panic over Greek debt is overblown because even if the country refused to pay any of its debt, the default would amount to “less than 3% of the entire eurozone economy.”

2. Sinking euro and strong dollar

Matthew Lynn predicted this week that the euro
EURUSD, -0.6876%
would fall to parity with the dollar, and then head even lower, because of the “tense game of brinkmanship between Brussels and Athens before a compromise is worked out.”

3. Oil falls to six-year low

Crude oil prices hit a six-year low on Thursday, with the price of light, sweet crude for March delivery
US:CLH5
on the New York Mercantile Exchange slipping below $44 a barrel before recovering to close at $44.53.

While the drop in oil prices has been nothing short of breathtaking, investors can expect a typical commodity-price cycle, with a period of increasing production, and now increasing inventories, followed by a dramatic cutting of capital investment for new production, which will continue until prices recover significantly. Shawn Driscoll, manager of the T. Rowe Price New Era Fund
PRNEX, +0.32%
told Howard Gold this week that he expects oil to fall below $40 a barrel.

OPEC Secretary-General Abdalla Salem El-Badri said this week that he thought oil prices might have reached their bottom for this cycle and “will see some rebound soon.” Badri went so far as to say oil could eventually rise to $200, according to a Bloomberg report.

That runs counter to the prediction by Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal last week that “we’re never going to see $100 anymore.”

Some major investors believe that now is the time to build up large holdings of oil-related stocks to be positioned for the eventual rebound in prices. Blackstone Group LP
BX, +0.82%
President Hamilton “Tony” James said the company was “scrambling” to invest up to $10 billion in energy companies, according to Bloomberg.

Two weeks ago, Jeff Reeves discussed how investing in oil stocks now could be painful over the short term, but very profitable over the long term.

4. Big Oil cuts back

Despite the decline in oil prices, Royal Dutch Shell PLC
RDS.A, -0.36%
reported an increase in fourth-quarter profits on Thursday, with improved profits in its processing business outstripping declines in the exploration and production division. But the company also said it would cut its capital expenditures on production by $15 billion over the next three years. Despite the profit and spending cut, Shell’s shares declined 3% on Thursday.

ConocoPhillips
COP, +0.54%
on the other hand, reported a fourth-quarter loss. The company announced in December that it would reduce 2015 capital spending by 20% because of the decline in oil prices. ConocoPhillips said Thursday it would lower spending by another 15%. Investors were pleased, sending the company’s shares up 1% on Thursday.

5. Apple’s earnings blowout

Apple Inc.’s
AAPL, +1.39%
stock hit a new intraday high on Friday, as momentum continued after the iPhone maker reported a 38% year-over-year increase in profit for its fiscal first quarter, to a record high of $18 billion on Tuesday.

Fourth-quarter earnings per share came in at $3.06, rising from $2.07 a year earlier, and greatly exceeding the consensus estimate of $2.60, among analysts polled by FactSet.

Apple’s fourth-quarter smartphone shipments were just short of volume leader Samsung’s shipments.

Some analysts are concerned that roughly 70% of Apple’s sales come from the iPhone and say that most of its market-share upside is already “baked in” to the stock price. But it’s important to consider that the smartphone has become the ideal device for so much of the everyday activities a person might want to do when using the Internet, email, messaging, sharing photos, reading books or listening to music. For most people, it is far more convenient than sitting at a desk in front of a PC, or even than picking up a tablet. Maybe Apple’s focus on the iPhone is exactly the right strategy for the company to follow for the next several years.

And when thinking about the stock price, the shares, even at their record high of $120 on Friday, traded for just 13.3 times the consensus 2016 EPS estimate of $9.02. That’s a considerably lower forward price-to-earnings ratio than the S&P 500 as a whole, which trades for 14.8 times aggregate 2016 EPS estimates. And Apple has also been boosting EPS through stock buybacks, which have lowered the average share count by 7% over the past year.

8. Amazon surprises

Amazon.com Inc.
AMZN, -0.01%
had a rough 2014, when its stock fell 22%, as investors grew tired of the company’s focus on growing revenue and market share, while showing small profits during the first half of the year and losses during the second half, springing in great part from its Fire Phone failure. But the company surprised investors this week by reporting a 15% increase in fourth-quarter sales and a smaller-than-expected decline in profit.

Philip
van Doorn

Philip van Doorn covers various investment and industry topics. He has previously worked as a senior analyst at TheStreet.com. He also has experience in community banking and as a credit analyst at the Federal Home Loan Bank of New York.

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Philip
van Doorn

Philip van Doorn covers various investment and industry topics. He has previously worked as a senior analyst at TheStreet.com. He also has experience in community banking and as a credit analyst at the Federal Home Loan Bank of New York.

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